John 7:19-31, Jesus Is Not What You Think He Is

In Jesus’ conversations, He was never satisfied with just declaring Himself.  He also wanted to reveal the hearts of people.  Jesus answered the previous question, that His teaching was from God.  But now Jesus asks the next question: “Why do you seek to kill Me?”  This question is an indication that the people already were not interested in seeking the will of God because they were not even obeying Moses whose teaching they believed had come from God. 

The initial response was from the people.  “Who is trying to kill you?”  The leaders knew they were wanting to kill Jesus but were likely surprised when Jesus mentioned this.  It went back to John 5:1-15, when, on the Sabbath, Jesus healed the man at the Pool of Bethesda.  For this reason the Jews persecuted Jesus, and sought to kill Him, because He had done these things on the Sabbath (5:16). 

The people weren’t privy to the plotting of the leaders.  They accused Jesus of being demon-possessed.  How else could they, being at the feast to fulfill their obligation to Moses, be accused by Jesus of disobeying Moses?  Jesus explained powerfully, reminding them of the Sabbath healing, but also revealing the hypocrisy of the situation.  They held that it was lawful to circumcise on the Sabbath but unlawful to make a man completely well on the Sabbath.  Jesus’ doctrine was true; the doctrine of the Jews was inconsistent with the truth. 

·       7:25-27: question #3, “Is this not He whom they seek to kill?”  This question was asked by Jews from Jerusalem (Judaist Jews) rather than Jews from the Dispersion (from elsewhere in the Roman Empire, Hellenistic Jews).  The local Jews would have been on the scene when the man by the pool was healed. 

The fact that no one had arrested Jesus led into another question: “Do the rulers know indeed that this is truly the Christ?”  This question was quickly answered by those who raised it. “Jesus cannot be the Messiah because we know where Jesus is from, and no one will know where the Messiah is from when He really comes.”  We are assuming they thought Jesus was from Galilee, where He was currently living and where His earthly family resided.  One wonders why they said this, since the Jews knew the Messiah was to be born in Bethlehem (Jn. 7:40-42; Matt. 2:1-8), fulfilling Micah 5:2.  Perhaps the Jewish leadership was just scrambling to come up with Biblical proof that this Jesus was not the Christ. 

We will pick this up in the next post.  But let me say something else.  You should be aware that some or even much of what you know about Jesus may not be true.  Like the Jewish leaders, people’s view of Jesus is often skewed.  It may be based on something they heard someone say or imagined or assumed.  As you read John’s account, my hope is that you will do as Jesus said: Do not judge according to appearance, but judge with righteous judgment.